Rahul Mehra in Darr is one of the most iconic roles played by Shah Rukh Khan. However, very few know that Shah Rukh got the negative role only after several other actors refused to play a villain on the big screen. Darr was also the first collaboration film between Shah Rukh and the late legendary filmmaker Yash Chopra.
In the Yash Raj Films documentary series, The Romantics, Shah Rukh recalled his first impression of Yash Chopra. He said, “I thought Yash Chopra would be a tall guy with long hair and a half hippie look, very cool and new. So, I was stunned because it was a very simple, very candid guy, and completely different from what I had imagined.” Shah Rukh further revealed what Yash Chopra told him before offering him the role: “He told me, ‘I think you are a great actor. It’s a villain’s role. He was very honest. I wanted to cast someone else, but they are not willing to do it. I really think it’s a very good role and you should do it.'”
The actor admitted that since he was constantly being offered “good guy” roles at the time, he wanted to do something different. “I agreed to do the role because everybody was offering me good guy roles, I didn’t want to do good guy roles. I wanted to play a villain. And it was an aggressive film. It had romance, but it was a very cheesy film. In today’s time, I think I would have been jailed if I had done a role like that.”
Yash Chopra also praised Shah Rukh’s dedication on the sets and compared him to Amitabh Bachchan. The filmmaker said, “Shah Rukh will let you do hundreds of rehearsals. And different types of acts, different scenes. He doesn’t give up until he or the director is satisfied. Amitabh Bachchan has the same dedication.”
Shah Rukh further explained how his iconic stutter in the film “Kiran” came into being. “I knew a young boy who was my classmate and stuttered, and then we did some study, a BBC documentary which showed that people’s brain becomes conscious of a sound. I spoke to Yash ji about using this aspect in the character and it was Aditya Chopra who suggested that since you become conscious of a sound, make him conscious of the woman he loves the most, her name. So I stutter only on the word “Kiran”.”
